Games must achieve photorealism in order to open up new genres, says 2K

With Halo, Medal of Honor, Battlefield, Crysis, Call of Duty, and countless other shooters coming, the market is a bit inundated. Unique and genre-bending games like Journey, for example, aren't easy to come by, but in order for this industry to truly reach the next level and expand into new genres, pure photorealism is needed, argues 2K Games boss Christoph Hartmann.

Speaking in a soon-to-be-published interview with GamesIndustry International, Hartmann noted that the film industry still has an advantage over video games in the sense that movie directors can easily portray strong emotions, like sadness or love. Because that's difficult to do in games, many developers go back to the action and shooter games, which are safer bets.

"Recreating a Mission Impossible experience in gaming is easy; recreating emotions in Brokeback Mountain is going to be tough, or at least very sensitive in this country... it will be very hard to create very deep emotions like sadness or love, things that drive the movies," he said. "Until games are photorealistic, it'll be very hard to open up to new genres. We can really only focus on action and shooter titles; those are suitable for consoles now."

He continued, "To dramatically change the industry to where we can insert a whole range of emotions, I feel it will only happen when we reach the point that games are photorealistic; then we will have reached an endpoint and that might be the final console."

Stay tuned for the complete interview in which we discuss next-gen gaming, 2K's portfolio, Wii U, and building up talent in the organization.

I couldn't disagree agree more. I personally believe it's more important to be innovative and nail gameplay first. I would rather have a game that looks like $#@! and plays great, than have a game that looks photo realistic and plays like ass. We don't NEED photo realism, but I wouldn't mind it. So long as the game is fun.

all games suffer from weird tongue movement. i can't think of one game where a character has opened their mouth and the tongue hasn't distracted me....it just flaps up and down, whereas our tongues form the words we speak. its quite a HUGE disconnect.

I couldn't disagree agree more. I personally believe it's more important to be innovative and nail gameplay first. I would rather have a game that looks like $#@! and plays great, than have a game that looks photo realistic and plays like ass. We don't NEED photo realism, but I wouldn't mind it. So long as the game is fun.

It has to be in the middle.... I can't accept $#@! looking games because they play good. If that was the case, I'd just continue the old emulator gaming.... Good looking game, and good game play; that's the ticket.

It has to be in the middle.... I can't accept $#@! looking games because they play good. If that was the case, I'd just continue the old emulator gaming.... Good looking game, and good game play; that's the ticket.

I couldn't disagree agree more. I personally believe it's more important to be innovative and nail gameplay first. I would rather have a game that looks like $#@! and plays great, than have a game that looks photo realistic and plays like ass. We don't NEED photo realism, but I wouldn't mind it. So long as the game is fun.

You just described Battlefield 3 and Crysis 2.

I do agree with, F34R on this, A game that balances both graphics and gameplay together should be encouraged.

It has to be in the middle.... I can't accept $#@! looking games because they play good. If that was the case, I'd just continue the old emulator gaming.... Good looking game, and good game play; that's the ticket.

Originally Posted by FonFahbre

You just described Battlefield 3 and Crysis 2.

Agreed with Crysis 2. Though BF3 is $#@!ing epic.

I do agree with, F34R on this, A game that balances both graphics and gameplay together should be encouraged.

We all want both. I am just saying if I had to choose one over the other, advanced AI, new innovations, great game play, bug free game play will win me over WELL before photo realism. If they focus on everything BUT photo realism FIRST, then fine, add photo realism once it is all said and done.

Even best PC games out there on the fastest PC's STILL are not photo realistic. The new consoles will not even be close to the most powerful PC's out there.

There will always be games like Tetris and Angry Birds. But this is not about those types of games. We're talking about $60 titles here. How can we get even more people to play and spend their money? Creating more genres. Well, why can't we creating a genre like a romantic comedy game?

I'll tell you why. And this is why men love video games, and women have been slow to come around. When I see something blow up in a video game, or with CGI in movies, it looks real -- and it is exciting. You blow someone's face off and you can make it look real. But when you see someone cry, or kiss, or get angry -- it looks fake. It looks like manaquins.

To continue to progress and MAKE MORE MONEY, the developers have to go beyond gameplay, and beyond action shooters and sports games (in fact this is one HUGE problem I have with Madden, emotionless characters/players). You need your characters to portray emotions. And the only way to do that is photorealism. Because with all that video games have acheived, they still can't make a character smile or frown in a way that looks in anyway real or convincing.

We all want both. I am just saying if I had to choose one over the other, advanced AI, new innovations, great game play, bug free game play will win me over WELL before photo realism. If they focus on everything BUT photo realism FIRST, then fine, add photo realism once it is all said and done.

Even best PC games out there on the fastest PC's STILL are not photo realistic. The new consoles will not even be close to the most powerful PC's out there.

Keep your expectations LOW for this force.

I wouldn't choose one over the other. I'd choose not to spend money on a game that doesn't fit my criteria.
These two categories:

He doesn't make himself very clear, but I get it and I agree with him.

Originally Posted by Soldier 95B

I couldn't disagree agree more. I personally believe it's more important to be innovative and nail gameplay first. I would rather have a game that looks like $#@! and plays great, than have a game that looks photo realistic and plays like ass. We don't NEED photo realism, but I wouldn't mind it. So long as the game is fun.

Originally Posted by Blacksite

Same here. Good graphics are always nice in a video game but if the gameplay falls short then what's the point?

I don't think that is the point. I don't think he means to argue that photorealism is equal in importance to gaming. Basically, gaming elements give us one thing and non-gaming elements give us another. And the endgame combines the potential of both to create one total experience. Gaming is mostly dependent on control schemes and creative gameplay concepts, both of which aren't as directly influenced by current technology as non-gaming elements are (narrative maybe notsomuch, but visual things like graphics, animations, etc. are). The implication is that there is more potential yet to be possible from the non-gaming side...and I agree.

I think by "photorealism" he actually means that in terms of visual and motion (cuz a photorealistic person that moves like a robot defeats his argument entirely). Photorealism, then, would enhance the non-gaming potential in ways that only photorealism can do (heightened connections to convincing human expressions, animations, vistas, and so on that stand equal to cinema, for instance). So when gaming can do all it can do on its own when trying to work with non-gaming elements, the potential of the non-gaming elements will also only go so far without total photorealism (as he defines it). The benefits are passive, yet an essential link towards expanding towards greater overall experiences through a given genre, and by extension, a given game.

We all want both. I am just saying if I had to choose one over the other, advanced AI, new innovations, great game play, bug free game play will win me over WELL before photo realism. If they focus on everything BUT photo realism FIRST, then fine, add photo realism once it is all said and done..

I think he meant BF3 at launch when it was basically a paid beta. It also took them like 100 days to fix the voice chat, which is unacceptable.
Yeah, it is pretty epic after the patches but have you played it at launch?

I think he meant BF3 at launch when it was basically a paid beta. It also took them like 100 days to fix the voice chat, which is unacceptable.
Yeah, it is pretty epic after the patches but have you played it at launch?

I won't downplay your opinion on the game(Since I've said that DICE are far from epic). Putting the single player aside, It does have a fun, enormous multiplayer but I just wish DICE would manage it properly. The last time I played it, DICE had taken away dedicated servers and gave gamers options to fully unlock a variety of things or everything for a fee instead of letting each individual go through the effort of unlocking them. Of course this is most likely the handy work of, EA themselves, who knows.

I won't downplay your opinion on the game(Since I've said that DICE are far from epic). Putting the single player aside, It does have a fun, enormous multiplayer but I just wish DICE would manage it properly. The last time I played it, DICE had taken away dedicated servers and gave gamers options to fully unlock a variety of things or everything for a fee instead of letting each individual go through the effort of unlocking them. Of course this is most likely the handy work of, EA themselves, who knows.

All the dedicated servers are still there. They are just lost in all the new publicly made servers. If you go to filter and type in the dedicated server name, the entire list of those servers pop up. Those are the only ones I use. The name escapes me right now. You just need to type in the first few letters. They just need to change the ui so that you can choose them easier from a drop down.

I don't see why. Graphics have absolutely nothing to do with gameplay, which defines what genre a game belongs to. There have been significant graphical improvements in the past few years but we haven't seen much development on the innovative side. In fact, there have been a lot of good creative-innovative games that have had graphically superior contemporaries which failed when put p against the formers.

[CENTER]You see, madness, as you know, is like gravity. All it takes is a little push!

Maybe I missed a post but I think the developer is not talking about what most here are talking about. What he is implying is that we need photorealism to appreciate the emotions and proper connectedness to the characters in video games to have new genres or new types of games. Like someone said...we can accept blowing stuff up and all that but when we see video game characters kiss or interact (humanly) on screen we have a disconnect because the motions aren't fluid...we don't believe these are real characters and we cant relate or don't connect (like we do in a movie with real actors). He says we need photo realism to create the settings and characters for us to become emotionally tied. Without that he says new game types won't evolve or be possible.

Me..I agree a bit...it will open up a massive new space for games...if the romance or sadness is more visable...but I think some people have obtained that already. Some of the best games are ones in which we just love the characters and the story telling makes them live with us for days until we can help them finish their quest. I also look at (games) like Heavy Rain in which you are almost holding your breath and nervous because everything changed the outcome of the game...and the emotions from the characters had you vested in seeing the story turn out. I think its possible now....but its hard to replicate and the risks are high for developers. It will be much easier to obtain with photo-realism and we should see more of it in games going forward as we get closer and closer.

Photorealism does not equal good graphics. LittleBigPlanet,inFamous 2 and Ni No Kuni all have great graphics.I prefer great game design and an original art direction visually. graphics add absolutley nothing to concepts or new game ideas.Creativity is what is needed as with any industry.

Honestly it all depends on the game. If it looks good and interests me (it also needs to sound good, $#@! voice acting does not interest me), then it's one step closer to me shelling out the money to buy it.

Gameplay is important, but that doesn't mean it has to be a platformer or shooter or something. A game like Beyond: Two Souls looks top notch to me. Honestly a game needs an interesting story and interesting characters to get me to spend $60 dollars on it (why I love games like Uncharted, Dead Space, Metal Gear Solid, Mass Effect, Batman Arkham City, etc.).

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